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Article: Colon Cancer: The Need for Early Screening.
- Article from:
- Medical Update
- Article date:
- January 1, 1999
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1999 Benjamin Franklin Literary & Medical Society, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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If all men and women over 50 were screened for colon cancer, experts estimate that the death rate could be cut by one third. About 131,000 new cases of colorectal cancer are expected in 1999, with 55,000 deaths from the disease--the second most common cause of cancer death in the United States. Yet too few Americans are being screened for the disease.
Understandably, most of us are not very keen about having a tube inserted up the rectum, nor in smearing stool specimens on a card. And too few doctors, apparently, are insisting that their patients undergo these tests. With these tests, however, up to 90 percent of these cancers would be detected early enough to be ...